The present invention relates to recording medium reproduction apparatus and more particularly to a recording medium reproduction apparatus characterized in that a skip reproduction over a designated section can be done according to the contents therein.
A still image reproduction apparatus proposed in Japanese Patent Publication No. 3-248370A aims to solve the problem of unnaturalness arising from gaining access to one recorded image that one would not like any other person to watch when a plurality of recorded still images on a tape-type recording medium reproduction medium are sequentially reproduced.
DVD (Digital Versatile Disk) players are equipped with parental locks for restricting the reproduction of scenes such as violence or sex scenes (hereinafter called adult scenes) contained in the contents and considered as those badly affecting the sound growth of infants and minors.
In that case, the control level based on the prescribed ethical standard is pre-recorded on the disk corresponding to the parental lock function by matching each scene in the contents to the ethical standard.
While the parental lock function is kept effective after the reproduction level based on the control level is set to the DVD player, only a scene wherein the control level recorded on the disk conforms to the reproduction level is reproduced when the disk is played, and any other scene is skipped. In place of the skip reproduction, an alternative scene may be reproduced by replacing any scene to be skipped with the alternative one beforehand.
More specifically, infants and minors are allowed to enjoy sound and images included in the contents at parent's ease because the use of the parental lock function makes it possible to skip any adult scene on the basis of the control level added by the contents supplier without any specific operation on the part of user.
However, the parental lock function of the DVD player will not be performable in a case where the control level is not recorded in the contents for reasons of the contents supplier's own such as cost restrictions.
Under the circumstances, parents of children are compelled to do a skip reproduction as specified when the children want to watch and hear the contents by examining the contents from beginning to end and specifying scenes to be skipped.
Therefore, the demand is for a contrivance to be developed for relieving those parents of the operational burden.